AEW and NXT Wednesday Night Wars: 3 winners of night #4

Finn Balor

When Prince Devitt turned on his Apollo 55 tag team partner Ryuske Taguchi in 2013, he told the New Japan Pro Wrestling fans in attendance that he was done being “Mr. Nice Guy” before dubbing himself “The Real Rock N’ Rolla”.

Fast forward to 2019, and it appears that the man now known as Finn Balor showed us shades of the man who founded Bullet Club over six years ago, as he turned heel for the first time in his WWE career with a viciously awesome beatdown on Johnny Gargano.

The setup for this was perfect. After the Undisputed Era beat down Keith Lee following the main event, Tommaso Ciampa sauntered down the ramp to confront to the gold-draped foursome, followed by Gargano.

Once Balor’s music hit and he made his joined his fellow ex-indy darlings mid-ring, you’d be forgiven for thinking that this was the start of the build toward the next WarGames match.

But with one Pele Kick to Gargano, any thought of that happening was flushed away. After that, Balor punctuated his change in attitude with a running dropkick that bowled over Gargano, the ring barricade, and several “fans” and one of the nastiest looking Bloody Sunday/1916’s Balor has ever executed in WWE, which was sold with a Gargano stretcher job.

While it seems off to turn a beloved figure like Balor, especially so soon after his NXT return, this made plenty of sense.

As popular as Balor is, the babyface side on NXT is filled with top-level talent — Ciampa, Gargano, Matt Riddle, Velveteen Dream — so letting him flesh out his villainous persona opposite those workers will make it easier for him to garner heat. Plus, he is the high-profile opponent Gargano needs while Gargano sits outside of the NXT Title picture.

The closing segment benefitted everyone involved, but especially Balor.